


Permafrost Heart

by Problematic_Wesker_Stans



Category: Biohazard | Resident Evil (Gameverse)
Genre: F/M, Manipulation
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-24
Updated: 2020-03-17
Packaged: 2021-02-28 06:48:22
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,527
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22869625
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Problematic_Wesker_Stans/pseuds/Problematic_Wesker_Stans
Summary: In a quiet Raccoon City on the eve of its destruction, the bored and jaded Wesker siblings plot to ruin the youngest and most vulnerable member of the elite S.T.A.R.S. team: pious, naive Rebecca Chambers. Will her virtue survive a trial worse than the T-Virus apocalypse, or will she succumb to her fate as another one of Albert Wesker's pitiable conquests?---[Slight AU, pre-RE0/RE1]
Relationships: Albert Wesker/Alex Wesker, Rebecca Chambers/Albert Wesker
Comments: 13
Kudos: 44





	1. We Used To Play Games

* * *

_"He calculates how far a man can proceed in villainy without risking reputation, and has chosen women for his victims, that his sacrifices may be wicked and cruel without danger."_

_-Dangerous Liaisons_

* * *

"Annette’s back in town.”

“Oh, I know.” He tossed the tennis ball. It hit the opposite wall of the lab and bounced back to him. 

“Will had her secreted away in Italy. Some ridiculous project to undermine the Travis family. A complete waste of her skills.”

“He _was_ hiding her, wasn’t he?” The tennis ball hit the wall again. “No matter. She always comes home.” He caught the ball, squeezing it in his fist.

“Stop that, Albert,” Alex said without looking up. She adjusted her glasses and continued leafing through a pile of glossy photographs.

Wesker lowered his feet from the steel table. He rolled the bright yellow ball beneath his palm, obliging his sister. 

“You’ve seen her already, then?” She arched a sharp eyebrow at Chris Redfield’s picture. She turned the photograph over, placing it face down on top of the others she’d already examined.

“Every inch of her.” Wesker leaned back in his chair, its back legs balanced precariously on the tile.

“How did she seem?”

“Depressed. Exhausted. Desperate.” He paused as Alex nodded. “Her body hasn’t held up well.”

“She’s a mother, Albert.”

“She had that baby _eleven years_ ago. That’s no excuse for –” he motioned to himself. “Letting _everything_ go. My God, her tits. Her perfect tits. Like a pair of deflated balloons.”

“Such a shame,” Alex said, dismissive. “Who’s this one?” She held up the last of the glossies. It was a headshot, taken for a Raccoon City Police Department identification badge.

Wesker frowned, squinting at the picture. “Rebecca… something. Carpenter? No, Chambers. Rebecca Chambers.”

“She looks all of twelve years old.”

“Truly,” he agreed, taking the picture from her. “Spencer wanted an inexperienced medic… so I found him one. An eighteen-year-old EMT from some shithole in Missouri. She mentioned her faith in the interview - _twice_. I almost told her she had the job on the spot,” he laughed, tossing the picture across the table.

“As bright-eyed and bushy-tailed as they come.” Alex smiled tightly. “Poor thing doesn’t look like she could survive a papercut.”

Brother and sister were quiet for a moment. An exhaust fan rattled at the far side of the lab.

“Quite a rag-tag team you’ve got,” Alex finally said.

“I expect a decent enough fight from a few of them.”

“Not our little Rebecca, though.”

“No…not our little Rebecca.” He grinned.

“And when will you send your rats out into Spencer’s maze?” She sniffled in the cold sterile air and pushed her glasses back up the bridge of her delicate nose.

“Late July.” He stared into Alex’s eyes, his chin resting on his palm. “And then I’ll be free of that old _fuck_ and his cult of blood-sucking sycophants.”

She looked down and away. “Whatever will you do with all of your time and talents, I wonder?” she asked, her voice breathy with a feigned wistfulness.

“Marry you.”

Alex laughed, a sound like polished bells chiming. “You’re insane.”

“Not quite.” He took a deep breath. “Leave Umbrella. Run away with me.”

She shook her head, still smiling. “Unbelievable,” she said quietly.

“I’m serious, Alex.”

“I’m sure you are.”

“Have you met someone else?” he demanded sharply, suddenly. “Someone better than me?”

“ _Albert_ ,” she scolded, narrowing her eyes at him. Her smile slipped away.

“Are you afraid?” He leaned forward, chair thudding against the tile. He stared at her, searched her face, all immovable ice. “You are. You’re still afraid of that tired old lunatic. We can kill him… turn him into a monster. No one will be the wiser when Umbrella falls. It would only be the two of us, then,” he whispered furiously.

“Listen to yourself,” she replied curtly. “Pathetic. Just a few months without me, and you’ve gone soft. You’re practically _defanged_.”

He reached across the table, taking her hand in his own. 

“You don’t remember how it feels, do you? How I feel inside of you,” he implored.

She watched him blankly.

“Well, I haven’t forgotten.” He yanked her hand, drawing her closer to him. She tried to pull away but he held her there firmly. She winced at the steady pressure of his grip. “No one hurts me like you, Alex. I want it back. I want all of you,” he hissed between gritted teeth.

“Do you know what I haven’t forgotten, _brother_? That you used to be _fun_ ,” she growled, tearing herself from his grasp. She rubbed her offended hand.

He sat up, spine straight, glaring at her. His nostrils flared.

“We used to play games,” she continued. 

“We were children.”

“I suppose I’m still a child at heart.” She glanced down the length of the table, at the discarded photograph. “Give me that.”

He rolled his eyes, but slid the picture towards her.

She studied Rebecca Chambers’s face intently, as if memorizing it. “Do you think she’s untouched?”

“What does it matter?”

“Just answer the question. We’ve had plenty of virgins, you and I. _Is_ she one?”

Wesker ran his hand through his hair. “I’m sure, yes. Why?”

“Let’s play another game,” Alex said, straightening out the stack of photographs. “One more.”

“No.”

“Baby brother…” she taunted. “Do you think you’ve lost it? That _je ne sais quoi_?”

“I haven’t lost a _goddamn_ thing, Alex. This is ridic–”

“Do you want me or not?” she snapped.

He leaned back. He crossed his arms. 

Alex smiled approvingly. _Of course you do_ , she seemed to say without a single word.

“Go on,” he ground out.

“How exactly does _Albert Auguste Wesker_ prove he hasn’t lost his edge?” She touched her fingertip to her lips. She frowned, mockingly thoughtful.

He opened his mouth, a cutting remark poised on his tongue. She held her hand up.

“No, no. No suggestions.” She smiled down at the picture of Rebecca Chambers. She tapped her lacquered nail against the photo. “While you’re getting your rats ready for sacrifice… why not _play_ with them a bit?”

“You want me to fuck her? Is that your game?” He looked down at the girl in the picture - wide brown eyes, skittish smile. “You know as well as I do that this is shooting fish in a barrel.”

“You should be thrilled, then.” She smirked - a twist of her mouth so arrogant that it rivaled his own. “All you’ve got to do is _compromise_ our sweet little Rebecca… and you’ll get whatever it is you want from me.”

Silence fell between them.

“I want to see you as you were not so long ago, Albert. Carefree… cold… cruel.” She licked her ruby red lips. “If I could get that boy back… I’d keep him in my bed forever.”

Wesker’s thigh bounced under the table. He stared at the bare wall over Alex’s head. 

“I’ll need proof that you’ve succeeded.”

His jaw clenched. “Such as? Bloody sheets?”

“How vulgar do you think I am?” she laughed. “No… bring me something better. Something meaningful.”

“This is idiotic,” he said.

“This is _fun_ ,” she countered. Her white teeth seemed to gleam under the hard fluorescent light. “Make her love you… and then destroy her. That’s easy enough, isn’t it?”


	2. The Medic

* * *

_“I shall possess this woman… I will even dare ravish her from the God whom she adores. What delight, to be in turns the object and the victor of her remorse!”_

_\- Dangerous Liaisons_

* * *

It was just after 9:30 AM, and she was on her fourth cup of coffee.

He’d watched her every time she made her way to the little kitchenette. She used a white mug with a pattern of pale pink roses around the base. She filled it halfway with coffee, then to the brim with half-and-half. She grabbed a handful of sugar packets, tearing them open and pouring them in two at a time.

She reminded him of a little field mouse - quick and plain and skittish. Her hands fluttered over the countertop, sweeping away grains of sugar. She shifted her weight from one leg to the other. She sniffed. Rubbed her nose. Bounced on the balls of her feet, stirring the coffee, spoon clattering noisily against the ceramic.

She never stopped fidgeting.

He could see every last twitch from where he sat. His desk was made of pale maple, scuffed and worn, and the RPD had been _generous_ enough to put the monstrosity just beside the coffee station.

Not that it mattered. Wall to wall, the office was nothing but a dusty hellhole.

He leaned back in his chair. The leather creaked and the springs groaned. The phone to his left beeped, red light blinking with an incoming call, and behind him, the copier let out a terrible grinding noise.

“ _Shit_ ,” someone muttered.

He linked his hands behind his head, gaze still firmly fixed on Rebecca Chambers. She fit in well here - scrawny, simple, forgettable.

_Dull_ , he thought, watching as she popped the spoon into her mouth, sucking it clean - an entirely sexual action that she somehow made entirely plain and dull. _As dull as the rest of them_.

The fact that Alex had selected her as a target was almost disappointing. It could barely be called a game at all. She might be a little shy, yes, but that was nothing. He’d wear her down in a matter of days. She’d protest, of course…blush at his advances, lower her eyes…tuck a strand of her nondescript hair behind her ear…bite her lip to keep from smiling…

“Captain?”

Redfield hovered beside him, casting a hulking shadow across his desk.

Wesker turned his chair a fraction of an inch.

“Here’s, uh…here’s what Irons needs on the McPeters case.” Redfield leafed through the file in his hand, shuffling papers. “No…hang on. Not that one…”

Wesker watched Chambers’s face crack into a bright, gleaming smile. She said something, the barest squeak of her voice carrying over the din of the office, to Officer Valentine. She offered Valentine a carton of creamer.

“I had it a second ago.” A sheet of paper brushed Wesker’s arm. Then another. Redfield had opened the file across the corner of his desk, shuffling through a messy pile of forms. Wesker ignored it, his dark stare still locked on the girl who leaned against the countertop, whose face lit up almost cartoonishly at her coworker.

“It was a 9.2…no…yeah, 9.2.10, or maybe –” 

“That will be all, Redfield. Thank you,” Wesker said, pushing the file away without so much as looking at it.

“Uh…,” Redfield trailed off, sounding confused as usual.

“Actually –” Wesker narrowed his eyes. He turned sharply towards his subordinate, his chair squealing in protest. “What do you know… about _that_ girl?”

Redfield blinked. He glanced in the direction of the kitchenette, frowning. “Ji– Valentine? I…I dunno. We haven’t really…talked.”

They had fucked, Redfield and Valentine. Were _currently_ fucking. Absolutely, without a doubt. It was obvious and disgusting and insufferable. If he had to witness the two of them exchange longing stares over their respective desks _one more time…_

Redfield’s face contorted into a grimace as he droned on. “I mean, we talk. We work. A lot. Together. She’s…easy to work…with…”

“Not _her_.” Wesker interrupted, rolling his eyes. “The medic.”

“Oh,” Redfield’s shoulders dropped. He stammered for a moment, regaining his composure. “She’s… really young. I think.”

Wesker stared blankly up at him.

“Eighteen?” Redfield croaked, shifted uneasily. “Maybe?”

“I’m aware. What else can you tell me about her?” He pressed through nearly clenched teeth.

Redfield took a deep breath, furrowing his brow in a nearly thoughtful way. “She goes to that Pentecostal church up on Ennerdale. The big one in the warehouse. It’s all she talks about.”

Wesker hummed in agreement. “And? Anything else?”

“She’s really smart. She has a full ride to Raccoon University.” Redfield shrugged. He seemed to be searching around the office then, looking for an escape from the strained conversation.

“What could she possibly be studying?” Wesker snapped. 

She hadn’t mentioned being a student during the hiring process. Had it been a throw-away line in her profile? Something “insignificant” to Umbrella’s incompetent fucking management? A damned student, at the only college in Raccoon. So many connections she would have made, so many more people to notice her missing; it was sloppy, _extremely_ sloppy, almost amateur. _How could they have missed it?_

“Internal medicine, I think?” Redfield stepped back, tapping the spine of the manila folder against his thigh.

“Internal medicine, _you think_ ,” Wesker mocked, glaring. She hadn’t said a word about it. Not one word. _How dare she–_

“Yeah. She’s pre-med or whatever. You know, like _E.R._ ”

Wesker glowered at him, silent.

Redfield licked his lips, slowly inching away. “The TV show? _E.R._? It’s about a hosp-”

“I _know_ what it’s about, Redfield.” Wesker pushed away from his desk, the drawers rattling and the chair creaking with the sudden movement. He stood, tugging hard at his tactical vest. He hooked a finger into his collar and undid the first button of his dress shirt. “Take the file to Marini. He’ll give you the form. Don’t bother me with anything so trivial again.”

Wesker shouldered past him, not bothering to wait for Redfield’s response. He leveled his sights squarely on Chambers.

_Pentacostal. Pre-med. Barely legal._ Alex might as well have offered the girl up on a silver platter. An overworked, overwhelmed, infuriatingly modest prodigy.

Rebecca Chambers laughed - _giggled_ \- at something Valentine said. She raised her steaming mug to her lips, smiling behind it, eyes bright and wide and deliciously, utterly, _perfectly_ vapid.

He crossed the space to the coffee station in four long strides.


	3. A Proverbial Fire

* * *

_“You are a genuinely wicked woman.”  
_

_\- Dangerous Liaisons_

* * *

The screen door slammed shut behind him. Sweaty and miserable, his jog through the old farmhouse slowed, his heart pounded hard in his chest. He wiped his face with the front of his gray t-shirt, cringing when he realized it was drenched as well. 

He’d run nearly five miles in just under thirty-two minutes. It was a hard push - one he would pay for later. But for thirty-two glorious minutes, his mind had gone quiet, nearly silent, and the thoughts that had nagged him throughout the day had loosened their grip.

Passing through the kitchen, he snatched the cordless phone from its charger and dialed the number without looking. The line on the other end rang twice before he heard the telltale _click_ of someone picking up.

“Where have you been?” he growled before she could greet him.

There was a disembodied sigh. “Around.”

“You know, I’ve called several –”

“Five times. You’ve called five times in two days.” She sounded so very bored. 

He held the receiver away from his face and glared at it for a moment before returning to the conversation. “Well, _answer_ then.” He yanked open the refrigerator door.

“I was busy.”

He paused, his unblinking stare on the sterile, barren shelves in front of him. There was an unopened jar of pickles pushed to the back of the fridge, and a half-drunk bottle of Coca-cola - flat and syrupy by now, no doubt. “You were busy? For two _entire_ days?”

“Yes,” she said.

His jaw clenched. He tossed the door shut with a muffled thud. “You want me to ask, don’t you? You want me to ask what you’ve been doing. So that you can rub it in my face.”

“No.”

“Don’t be a _cunt_ , Alex,” he snarled.

Her inflammatory laughter tinkled like bells in his ear. “Is it going so badly with that poor girl, little brother?”

“Oh, _fuck you_. Truly.”

“Such language tonight…”

He took a deep breath, on the verge of hanging up. His grip on the phone tightened. Sweat beaded and dripped down his back. “She is… unresponsive.”

“Unresponsive? To _your_ charms? Surely you haven’t lost that magic…”

“Of course not,” he snapped. “I’d like to see _your magic_ under these circumstances. I can’t even work up a mild interest in that dumb slut, virgin or not.”

Alex clicked her tongue. He leaned against the countertop, sighing into the receiver.

“She’s so…so banal and insipid, and… _colorless_ ,” he lamented.

_Colorless. Always dressed in muted browns and dull greens. Hair chopped off in a blunt, sexless bob. Narrow hips, jutting shoulders, a body like a boy who’s voice had just begun to crack…_

“That should make the game all the easier,” Alex said, her simmering tone like a cat’s purr. “She should be mesmerized by you. The bored little Czarina to your intoxicating Rasputin, yes?”

“You don’t understand.” He pinched the bridge of his nose, squeezing his eyes shut against the glaring kitchen lights. “There’s nothing for her to be _mesmerized_ by. Nothing happened. Nothing _could_ have happened.”

Rebecca Chambers wasn’t _bored_ at all, from the look of her during their conversation that morning. God only knew how that wasn’t the case. She had smiled and chirped and fidgeted all through the brief talk, unbelievably breezy.

Unbelievably simple.

“Oh, come now.” He could almost _hear_ Alex examining her nails, as dispassionate as ever. “You make her sound about as delectable as primordial slime. She _is_ a living, breathing woman, isn’t she? Plain, perhaps… but not grotesquely deformed.”

“In theory, I suppose. The practice is lacking though.”

“Tell me what you’ve been doing to seduce our little angel,” she goaded. “Tell me _everything_.”

“Uncomfortably long eye contact. Forays into her personal space. Direct conversation, disarming smiles…” He paused, reflecting for a moment. “Asking questions, hoping she’ll think I actually give a damn.”

“Questions about what, exactly?”

“Her position. Her thoughts on the direction of S.T.A.R.S.,” he admitted, exasperated.

Alex was silent for a beat. He heard her heavy exhalation before she spoke, clearly disappointed. “That’s all? Oh, Albert.”

“It’s always been enough,” he snapped, bristling at the saccharine pity in her tone.

“I think…you’ve gotten fat and lazy on this steady diet of flavorless midwestern women. That’s what it is.” She _hmmed_ softly. “Raccoon City has ruined you. My god, you don’t even know how to flirt anymore.”

He clenched his jaw, forcing his voice to stay flat and impassive. “What can I say? They breed them fast and loose in Ohio.”

_Not tonight. He wasn’t about to let her claw her way beneath his skin. The city was a shithole, the people were unforgivably dim, but he was just who he’d always been. Brilliant. Untouchable. Relentless._

“Let’s up the ante,” she said. He could hear the curve of her wicked smile beneath her words.

“No.”

“ _Yes_ ,” she insisted, louder, sharper. “I can see your motivation to finish our challenge is quickly flagging. I’d say it’s time to light a proverbial fire beneath you.”

“ _Alex–_ ”

“No orgasms.”

“ _What?_ ” he cried, his voice nearly breaking.

“You heard correctly. Don’t you dare cum. Don’t touch yourself. Don’t fuck any of your usual floozies,” she said derisively. “Not one _petit mort_ until you’re nestled between her sweet, silly thighs.”

“For Christ’s sake, this is ridicu–”

“Now, now. No arguing. Just get to it. The sooner you break in that little filly, the sooner you can claim your reward.”

He heard a pop in the background, the soft fizz of something pouring into a glass. It sounded very much like money - _his_ money - going down a drain. 

“What was that?” he asked, nearly breathless.

She swallowed something, _loudly_. “Oh, I have no idea. You know me and alcohol - I’ll drink any old thing that I find laying around.” There was a terrible silence, and then: “It’s the rose one, if that helps.”

“The fucking _Armand de Brignac_?” His heart pounded against his ribs. “I bought that for _us_ , Alex! _For us_! I had to bid on that bottle!”

“Ah yes… I seem to remember that now,” she murmured. “Do you know what would have been _scrumptious_? Having you here with me, in this great big bed… sharing this exquisite –”

He didn’t wait to hear the end of her sentence. With a roar, he hurled the receiver at the wall.


	4. Uncomfortable

* * *

_"Love, hatred, you have only to choose; they all sleep under the same roof; you can double your existence, caress with one hand and strike with the other.”_

_\- Dangerous Liaisons_

* * *

_Six thirty-four._

He heard her typing furiously across the room as he watched the clock. Every few moments, a weary sigh floated up from her desk. He rolled his eyes at her back.

_Six thirty-five._

The incessant _clacking_ of her keyboard was one of the few sounds in the office that evening. The air vent above his desk rattled. Footsteps echoed down the hall as officers changed shifts. An old car engine spluttered to life in the lot outside. His teeth ground in his head.

_Six thirty-six._

She hadn’t glanced up from her monitor for at least half an hour. She only typed, practically pounding on the damned keys, mumbling notes to herself. _What could she possibly have taken so many notes about?_ On her busiest day, her job consisted of putting band-aids on Redfield’s perpetually scraped knees and performing exemplar chest compressions on a doll.

He checked his watch again, and then the clock on the back wall for confirmation.

The last of her colleagues had left ages ago. It was Friday, after all. _Did Little Miss Church Mouse have nowhere else to be?_

Rocking back in his creaky leather chair, he looked down at the same police report he’d read over eight or nine times already, his eyes unblinking, unseeing. It wasn’t of any consequence, thankfully…not that anything crossing his desk ever seemed to be.

The world felt terribly dull. Raccoon City was practically comatose. He’d abandoned the illicit bet with his sister; the chance of luring her or the stupid young medic to his bed this weekend was highly unlikely. He would have to make do with his own company for a while. Or perhaps not…Alex would surely come around before leaving again. 

Certainly.

Probably.

_Hopefully._

The chime of _Windows_ shutting down started him to attention. Finally. He cleared his throat, pretending to straighten a haphazard pile of reports, tossing a bottle of White-Out into a drawer and slamming it shut with a _crack_. He ran a quick hand over the desk calendar - dog-earred, stained with rings of pale brown coffee - as if checking it for a nonexistent appointment, and he stood.

“Have a restful weekend, Miss Chambers,” he said briskly, collecting his coat from the hook behind his workspace.

When he turned back around, shoving his arm through a stubborn sleeve, he saw her. Standing there. Just _standing_ , glaring at him expectantly, her arms crossed over her flat chest. Her throat worked as she swallowed.

He fixed the collar of his jacket, and then the cuffs, almost leisurely. “Yes?” he asked, masking his agitation with a bored, impassive tone.

She took a quick, sharp breath, the start of a sentence, eyes narrowing into something that might have been _shrewd_ in her mind…but then she pursed her lips tightly, nothing but a pitifully strangled noise slipping out.

He pushed his chair back, tucking it into the desk, while a condescending smile spread across his face. “Well, if you _do_ think of whatever it is… you can tell me on Monday morning, hmm?”

“Sir, I’m uncomfortable.”

He blinked. “Pardon?”

Her narrow shoulders squared defiantly. “I’ve been trying to ignore it all week. I kept thinking maybe I was… wrong. But I’m not wrong, and I’m uncomfortable with the way you look at me, and I shouldn’t have to… _feel_ this way, at work. I want you to stop looking at me,” she said in a nearly resolute voice. “Like that.”

He fished in his pocket for his keys, grinning to himself. “You want _me_ to stop looking at you… _like that_ ,” he repeated, disbelieving.

“Yes, sir,” she said, suddenly very sure of herself. And then, a bit more quietly, “please.”

“Miss Chambers…” He shook his head, feigning disappointment. “I assure you that I have no idea what you’re talking about… but by all means, I will make a concerted effort to stop _looking at you_ all together.” He brushed by her, pausing at the door, gesturing impatiently for her to join him. “Now if you wouldn’t mind, I need to get home, because I don’t live in this office. And I’m sure you’ve got something… _Jesusy_ to do this evening, right?”

* * *

“I think she teared up then. I didn’t wait around to watch the theatrics,” he drawled. The microwave beeped twice behind him. “I’m so tired of fucking take-out. When are you going to call an end to this moratorium? You know _Ciarelli’s_ opened up again downtown. You always liked their prime rib.”

“ _Uncomfortable,_ ” Alex said for what must have been the seventeenth time, her voice a mixture of delight and curiosity as she ignored his attempts to draw her in. “And she said it just like that?”

He sighed into the phone, cradling it against his shoulder. He picked at the steaming carton of lo mein, plucking out one long, oily noodle and a shred of limp cabbage. “I don’t see what you find so fascinating about this.”

It _had_ to be the final nail in the coffin of her absurd game. Rebecca Chambers was, perhaps, the one challenge he would never conquer…and only because she was so infuriatingly, maddeningly goddamned _simple_. He had accepted this defeat, come to terms with it, digested it entirely, and he needed, _more than anything_ , for his sister to do the same.

“Of course you don’t see it. You’re an idiot,” Alex answered. She let out a sad, wistful hum. “The poor baby’s inching closer to you, and you can’t even be bothered…”

“No.” He punctuated the word by stabbing the reheated slop with cheap wooden chopsticks. “I _can’t_. Because this is insane.”

“You’ve captured her attention, clearly. You’ve just got to hold onto it… and the rest of her will follow.”

“ _Right._ ” He plucked at a clump of rubbery noodles. “I’m sure she’ll be very receptive to yet another conversation come Monday morning…”

“You cannot possibly wait until Monday. Strike while the iron is hot, while her blood is up. Women _adore_ being thoroughly upset once in a while.”

“Do they?” he laughed, wincing as he bit into a scalding-hot carrot. “I’d love to hear how you think I should offend her further. Follow her to her place of worship, perhaps? Just me and Miss Chambers? Bonding over the sacrament?” He snorted at his own cruel joke.

But Alex was dangerously silent on the other end of the phone.

Silent for far too long.

He dropped the lo mein on the counter, dark sauce sloshing over the sides of the carton. 

“ _No_.” He clenched his jaw tight, his eyes wide. “Absolutely not. This is too far, even for you –”

“I’m impressed, Albert,” she said quietly, as if she was mulling over every word. “I think you might still have it in you.”

“ _No_. No, no, no –”

“Be sure to wear something _extra_ nice. God will be watching.”


End file.
